Four things Clemson football fans can still give John Swofford credit for
The vast majority of Clemson football fans will understandably never be huge supporters or proponents of ACC Commissioner John Swofford, but that doesn’t mean everything he did for the conference was bad.
Earlier this summer, Swofford officially announced that he would be retiring following this year’s academic calendar and that drove many cheers from Clemson football fans, and that’s completely understandable.
Prior to the Tigers’ run at the top of the conference- and even at the beginning of that run- Swofford had done nothing to help the program and just about everything to hurt it, including sanctions and always seemingly bending the rules to make way for Tobacco Road teams to have inside tracks and to be looked more favorably upon.
That being said, we’ve given you plenty of content on the bad things that Swofford has done, but here are four things that Swofford can get at least a little bit of credit on from Clemson football fans. (Not much, but just a little- as we’ve noted).
4. One of the biggest proponents for the CFB Playoff
There’s a population of Clemson football fans that don’t remember a time before the CFB Playoff.
The Tigers have been the nation’s darling when it comes to CFB Playoff appearances since the inception and Swofford was one of the early pioneers for getting the playoff system in place. He has also been a proponent for expanding the playoff to eight teams to make sure that his conference is included.
Would the CFB Playoff have happened without Swofford’s support? Most likely. But it’s still something he was able to help accomplish during his time as the commissioner.